Be Careful What You Quest For
by kim-onka
Summary: ...because you may find it. Post-series. In which Syaoran reaches the goal of his journey in a way no-one expected, and it doesn't go as planned. Parody, crack, OOC. Happy Birthday to Nims !


I disclaim. Anyway:

Happy Birthday to Nims-chan! Aka Obsidian Buterfly. Health, ealth, happiness and success and so on~ :)

This is crack. It's not supposed to make much sense. But enjoy.

* * *

'Hey, you! Yes, you!'

Syaoran, Kurogane and Fai turned around as one, away from the large notice they had been contemplating. The notice said 'CONTACT YOUR INNER SELF. TALK IT OUT WITH YOURSELF. CONFRONT YOUR SPLIT PERSONALITY. DISCOUNT FOR TEENAGERS ON QUESTS.' There had been some debate as to how seriously this should be taken, although in truth it mainly consisted of Fai jokingly insisting that it might be just the thing Syaoran had been searching for and Kurogane grumbling sceptically, while the young traveller in question had been waiting with resigned patience for the quarrel to subside.

'Not you! Not you, either, no… I meant you! You with the brown hair!'

'Me?' Syaoran asked, looking at the figure running towards them. It was a golden-haired girl he recognised as Emeraude. She stopped before them, panting. The boy wondered just from how far away she had run.

'Yes, you! Ah, I can see you recognise me!'

'Have we met?' Syaoran asked cautiously.

'No!' she replied cheerfully. 'How could we? You've only just arrived in this world, right? But you must've met another me. I'm Emeraude.'

She extended a hand. Syaoran took it.

'I'm Syaoran,' he introduced himself, smiling. It was nice to meet someone familiar, especially if he didn't need to hide the fact that they looked familiar.

'And you don't give your real name away to strangers,' Emeraude added with a grin, shaking his hand. 'Of course. I was afraid I'd miss you, but I see you've already found us!'

Okay, now it was getting weird.

Fai intervened.

'Nice to meet you, Miss Emeraude, I'm Fai D. Fluorite. And this is our grumpy friend, Kuro-sama.' The magician indicated the already-seething ninja. 'What is it-'

'Fai forgot Mokona! Mokona is Mokona!' cried the white creature, jumping towards he girl.

'Ah yes, Mokona is Mokona,' Fai amended. 'Now, what is it that we have found, if you would kindly enlighten us?'

'Why, us!' Emeraude pointed towards the aforementioned notice, as if it explained everything. 'I can tell you are in a dire need of our services!'

'You mean this… contact you inner self kind of thing?' Syaoran asked slowly.

'Yes! You have another you inside your heart, am I right?'

'Um… yes, but…'

'Then you're in the right place.' The girl suddenly switched to business mode. 'We offer an unrivaled opportunity to face a projection of your inner self in a comfortable environment and have a heart-to-heart conversation with them. I can see you are on a quest, so I can offer you a special discount of, say, thirty percent. Thirty-five because you recognized me.'

She smiled beatifically, while at the same time managing to convey a sense of expectancy and a warning of crushing disappointment if he were to refuse.

'Well, I suppose it won't hurt to try,' Syaoran conceded, although he wasn't entirely sure about the truth of that statement.

'Great!' Emeraude's emerald eyes sparkled. 'Let's go! Oh, wait a second,' she stopped mid-step and glanced at Fai. 'Would you be interested, too?'

'Me?' the magician asked, clearly in surprise.

'Yes! There's someone living inside your heart, too,' she announced happily. 'Would you like to talk to them? I'm afraid I can't give you thirty-five, but, say, twenty if we treat it as a recommendation case, which will give Syaoran here another ten-'

'No, thank you.'

'Are you sure? This may be your one-in-a-lifetime chance and I'll make it twenty-five -'

'I am sure, thank you all the same,' Fai insisted, smiling lightly. 'The one living in my heart truly deserves not to be bothered by me anymore.'

'Oh. Fine then. Let's go, Syaoran!' Emeraude proceeded to drag the brunette towards a door that looked just like any other, behind which they soon disappeared.

A moment of stunned silence followed.

'She seemed awfully eager to get Syaoran-kun in contact with his inner self,' Fai commented finally. When no response apart from a grunt was forthcoming, he shrugged. 'Well, it's probably hitsuzen. Let's go eat while we wait.'

But back to Syaoran:

In a matter of minutes, which nevertheless left him with enough time to start doubting the wisdom of his compliance, Syaoran was led through what felt like a positive labyrinth and pushed inside a cozy, friendly-looking room (apparently the "comfortable environment").

'Enjoy! Thank you for choosing us! I'll come for you later!' Emeraude announced and shut the door before the boy had a chance to respond, not that he would know what to say.

No, actually, he would. He'd ask what was supposed to happen. It could be helpful to know.

Was it really possible that his quest ended here? Would he actually be able to finally talk to his clone that lived within him and ask him what it was he wanted to do from now on? Was he ready for that, for all his search?

…Syaoran was nervous.

Something caught his attention.

Without any apparent outside reason, the room was suddenly misty. Light particles of dust-like fog swirled through the air, and it took the brunette a while to realize that its source was none other than he himself, the centre of his chest to be precise.

His heart.

Speechlessly, he watched the mist solidify into a figure of a man.

He looked like an older Syaoran or, to Syaoran, the way his father had looked on the day he had entrusted him with his sword and sent to him to Yuuko's shop to search for the person waiting for him. Only not _exactly_ that way. To the best of Syaorn's memory, his father had not had one blue eye or any blood on his cheek.

The figure turned to stare at the boy, his face betraying slight surprise.

'Well?'

Syaoran blinked. This wasn't in his mental script.

'I-I'm sorry?' he stuttered, shocked out of his stage fright.

'That's nice to hear, but _what_ do you want?' The older Syaoran frowned, seemingly puzzled, and raised his hand to his face. It came off sticky with dark red blood.

'Um…' was the boy's panicky reaction.

'You know, lad, your mental image of your father could really use some work.'

'…well I…'

'Like, professional help.'

'…er…'

'And I am quite sure I did return that magic eye.'

The younger brunette nodded frantically, then hesitated, then decided to pull himself together and steer the conversation into safer waters. After all, this _was_ the long-awaited goal of his journey and it _would_ be a meaningful encounter with his past, a defiant face-off with his destiny and a solemn yet hopeful heart-to-heart with his other self/father/clone, as long as _he_ had something to say in this matter. And he had. Or so he hoped.

'Actually, I've been searching for a way to talk to you,' he hazarded. 'I wanted to know what you wanted to do next.'

This didn't appear to have the desired impression.

'What could I possibly want to do next?' the older Syaoran asked, almost in disbelief. 'In the real world I don't even exist, and if I ever did, you could say I'm dead now,' he continued in a perfectly casual tone of voice which somehow didn't sit well with the boy's intuitions of discussions about death. To make matters worse, he stretched nonchalantly. 'No getting back from the dead, I thought you knew _that_.'

'I do, but that's not the point! I mean, you're not dead!'

'I am not strictly alive either,' the clone pointed out. 'Anyway, it is said immortality is achieved via children. I doubt the author meant it that literally, but I do technically live in you.'

'Like in _Lion King_?' Syaoran asked before he could stop himself.

His father smiled. 'You could say that. I'm glad you remember. My efforts weren't completely in vain.'

Despite himself, the boy felt proud.

No, this was ridiculous. He had to _focus._ He was not _seven_, for Clow's sake!

'But wouldn't you like to live as yourself again?' he tried, hopefully.

'Not particularly.'

'You _wouldn't_?'

'Look, kid, I already lived like twice over. Three times if you count the rewind. Have you heard of letting people rest? Anyway,' the clone added as his son opened his mouth in shock, 'how would you achieve that?'

'I-I'll make it my quest-! To find a- a way-!' Syaoran stuttered.

'You mean another journey?'

'Yes! I'll travel between worlds until -'

'I _see_,' the father interrupted, sighing. 'So _that's_ the real issue here.'

'_What_ is the real issue?' Syaoran demanded.

'You're looking for a reason to continue your journey, because you don't want to accept the fact that you have to wander around aimlessly all your life. Your self-imposed mission to find a way to talk to me served the same purpose.'

'T-that – that's not true at all!'

'Son, I _am_ your father and I _have_ been living in your subconscious for some time now,' the older man said patiently. 'I know you.'

The boy thought he was not ready for this. He raised his hands defensively.

'I really just wanted to talk to you!' he protested.

'Oh yes, that's another point.' The older Syaoran raised his eyes at the ceiling, as if thinking or trying to recall something. 'You wanted to talk to me because of your identity crisis.'

'My _what_?' Now the younger Syaoran was incredulous.

'You are the son of your own clone. You were once removed from the timeline and replaced by another "you" – that is to say Watanuki – as our son. And you've been given to understand that in a logical universe, you shouldn't exist at all. So you wanted to meet your father in order to persuade yourself that you do, indeed, exist.'

'Wha- Of course I exist! Don't be-'

'Don't take me the wrong way. It's not your fault. Really, taking all this into account,' his father concluded, the tone of his voice clearly meant to be sympathetic and soothing, 'existential anxiety is nothing strange. Given your situation, you are doing quite well.'

Syaoran didn't feel like being soothed or sympathised with.

Instead, he felt increasing irritation as he gaped at the man in front of him. The surprisingly ungrateful, misunderstanding man who claimed to live in his subconscious and yet stubbornly refused to follow Syaoran's mental script, and happened to be his dad besides.

'I _didn't_ call you out so that you could _psychoanalyse_ me!' he snapped, his patience finally breaking. Father or not, part of his own psyche or not, his interlocutor clearly had no feeling of the moment. 'And I am _not_ suffering from existential anxiety, _thank you very much!_'

'The feeling of pointlessness of existence, then?'

'No!'

'Having to travel between worlds for no real reason for the rest of your life doesn't worry you?'

'No!'

'Really, now?'

'Well, actually it does,' Syaoran admitted, 'but I'll bear with it!'

'Dragging your friends along while they could really have their own lives to see to?'

'I- They wanted to!'

'Or they're just being kind?'

'They're not!'

'You really think so?'

'They can stop anytime-'

'-and leave you alone?'

'Yes!'

'You know they won't.'

'Well then _what_ do you _suggest_?'

'Suggest? It's not my job to suggest anything. Think of me as your subconscious trying to get through to you.'

'My subconscious? You're my _father!_'

'And you're a big boy now. You can deal with it.'

Syaoran rolled his eyes.

'So you don't want me to try to get you a physical body? Or anything, really?' he said, desperately attempting to return to what he thought of as the main topic and draw some conclusion from this weird conversation.

'Heavens, no. Focus on your own problems, don't dump them on me. Although I'm willing to help, of course.'

'What about mum? Sakura wanted to talk to her, too, and-'

'Oh right, your princess. How is it going with the two of you?'

'Don't you know? As my subconscious?' the boy asked sarcastically.

His father was unmoved. 'I was trying to make some light conversation before asking if it bothers you that she looks just like your mother.'

'_WHAT?_'

'_Is_ your mother, in a way. Or your mother was her, if you prefer.'

'…_what._'

'It does not help that you once tried to kill me.'

'YOU TRIED TO KILL ME FIRST!'

'That's just circumstances. That's beside the point.'

'That's unfair-'

'I don't know about _unfair._ For _unfair_, refer to Them, not to me.'

'Them _who_?' Syaoran asked, bewildered (albeit grateful) at the sudden change of subject and otherwise thoroughly exasperated.

'You know. Them. The,' his father lowered his voice conspirationally, 'Spinners.'

'Spinners?'

'Yeah.'

'Never heard of them.'

'Oh, but you have. Perhaps under a different name, but you certainly have. They control this world. The whole of the multiverse, in fact, and much more.'

'I never knew you were into conspiracy theories-'

'Had you spent as much time as I have stuck in a glass tube, you would have developed a certain insight into the way reality operates, too,' the clone replied sourly. 'They are there. Watching us. Always watching… from behind the wall.'

'The wall? What wall?'

'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players_._'

'Excuse _me_?'

'Sometimes I really wish you could have had some basic education before leaving our world, son. I bet you couldn't even calculate a surface integral.'

'A _what? _Look, do you _have_ to keep jumping topics like that?'

'It's been a while since I had the chance to talk to anyone, I may be out of practice. But don't tell me you've never thought of… the Wall.'

'Oh, you mean – that wall…'

'Yes, that one. The… fourth wall.'

Despite himself, Syaoran shuddered and cast a quick look around, as if someone could be listening in.

'We don't talk about it!' he hissed. 'The reality will disappear!'

'And be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable? And perhaps this has already happened?'

'We just _don't_!' the boy insisted. 'And stop throwing random popular culture references at me, I didn't grow up in your world! I _was_ inside a glass tube, too, if you've forgotten, and before that I was wandering around deserts in search for curse cures! So _excuse me_ if I've missed out on something!'

The older Syaoran sighed.

'And don't sigh on me, either!' the boy protested. 'I'm beginning to wonder _why_ I even wanted to talk to you-'

'-my point exactly, it was useless-'

'-but since we're still here, let me ask you one more time: is there anything, anything at all, you'd like me to do for you other than leave you alone in my subconscious?'

'Nope.'

Syaoran breathed deeply, trying to steady himself.

'Then I think we're done here.'

'Right. Bye.'

With that, the figure of the older Syaoran, the clone, shimmered slightly, his figure visibly becoming blurry, and dissolved once again into the fine mist which swirled back into the younger Syaoran's heart. The remaining brunette sat down heavily on the couch which he had hitherto ignored in his excitement, feeling rather tired.

'That went well,' he muttered weakly.

After some time there was a discreet knock on the door and Emeraude entered, only to find the client staring dumb-founded at the wall with a grim expression on his face. Wordlessly, although with an air of satisfaction at the job well done, she walked him out, charged him, charged him extra for the additional service of finding his friends and delivering him to them, and left the dimension travelers to their devices.

Needless to say, the awaiting trio were rather eager to learn the outcome. And they did, eventually, sort of.

Syaoran sat down heavily among his companions (it vaguely occurred to him that he wouldn't be able sit in any way other than heavily for a while), apparently not noticing their curious faces leaning towards him expectantly, and spoke in a hollow, lost voice.

'Never trust anything that is on discount.'

* * *

For reference, I referenced Shakespeare and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (but you knew that). The term "Spinner (of Stories)" is occasionally used in a certain anime to mean someone with the power to write stories which come true.

I have been known not to like (either) Syaoran very much, but I don't really care anymore, so it's nothing personal, just having fun :)


End file.
